An Unholy "Conversion"

In today’s New York Times, we are treated to more flimsy rationalizations from the Repugs on their opposition to fighting President Numbskull’s typically idiotic (and particularly cruel) SCHIP veto last week (this story may end up having more traction than the “General Betray Us” ad – it certainly should, anyway).

And we are also treated to the following from one of their leading “lesser lights”…

“If this was October of next year, I’d be really worried,” said Representative Roy Blunt of Missouri (pictured), the second-ranking House Republican. “But this is October of this year and the beginning of us getting our credibility back by showing that we are willing to take principled stands on spending.”

It continually amazes me to read quotes like this from the Repugs, since these insights end up stating at least as much about how they feel towards the vast majority of us than their actual positions.

Basically, Blunt thinks we’re stupid and we’ll just forget about their behavior on SCHIP next year. And he thinks that somehow taking a “principled stand on spending” is more important than letting millions of kids go without proper health care, to say nothing of the war and the Repugs’ calamitous mis-to-non management on a whole other host of issues.

And how hypocritical could it be for someone like Blunt to “find religion” on spending, when financial restraint was nowhere in sight for him and his chief benefactor, Tom DeLay, during the time of the Repug National Convention in Philadelphia in 2000?

As John Judis of Joe Lieberman Weekly tells us here (in a good article – shocking)…

…no one outdid DeLay, who was the party whip at the time, and his chief deputy, Missouri Representative Roy Blunt. Outside the convention hall, DeLay and Blunt stationed five lavishly outfitted antique rail cars, where congressmen could eat and drink, as well as reserve limousines and drivers if they wanted to tour the city--all thanks to DeLay's political action committee, Americans for a Republican Majority (ARMPAC), and Blunt's Rely on Your Beliefs PAC (RoyB). And that wasn't all: DeLay and Blunt dished up breakfast for House Republicans each morning, provided a hospitality tent where parties were held, and hosted an outing at the Aronimink Golf Club and an evening at the Electric Factory, where Blues Traveler played.

These festivities didn't come cheaply. DeLay reportedly raised almost $1 million to fund the events. And corporations, eager to score points with the powerful Republican leaders, donated their goods and services, too. For instance, according to the Houston Chronicle, those antique rail cars were an "in-kind contribution to ARMPAC" from Union Pacific.

A month before the convention, a new law had gone into effect requiring that organizations like DeLay's and Blunt's file regular reports with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) listing their contributions and expenditures. But, if you wanted to know exactly how much DeLay and Blunt blew on the 2000 convention, you would have to look elsewhere. That's because the documents their PACs filed for the months just before and after the convention list hardly any contributions or expenditures at all--certainly nothing that would explain the level of spending that took place in Philadelphia. A legal or ethical oversight, perhaps, but, if so, it seems not to be the only one that took place in that heady year, when DeLay came into his own as the most powerful Republican in Congress. The story of the missing convention expenses (and a related tale of the curious path taken by $150,000 that DeLay's PAC gave to Blunt that spring) reveal a lot about the symbiosis between DeLay and Blunt--and the way the two men turned greed and political power into cash.

The article then goes on to describe the financial nonsense perpetrated by Blunt and DeLay and their respective political action committees to keep their expenses from the 2000 convention off the books, using a third organization called the Alexander Strategy Group (ASG), which was “able to raise unlimited amounts of soft money without disclosing their donors or their expenditures” because they did not endorse candidates (it’s difficult to keep track of the money movements described in Judis’ article, but it points unmistakably to the fact that about $150,000 of expenses for the convention from Blunt and DeLay ended up not being reported, at a minimum; former House Repug Dick (“Barney Fag”) Armey spent lavishly also, but at least he reported it).

And Blunt is the guy who now wishes to take “a principled stand on spending” on the backs of our kids.

By the way, the name of Blunt’s PAC, as noted in the Judis article, is “Rely On Your Beliefs.”

Well, since his “beliefs” apparently are to lavish himself and his Repug peers and benefactors at the expense of those he was ostensibly elected to represent, then I would say that the name of his PAC is perfectly apt.